...Is he trying to commit political harakiri?
A former teacher has kindly (and savagely) marked the recent joint statement by MOE and IMH in red, like all good teachers do. Enjoy.
NUS Press says it chose not to publish essays on Thai politics after consulting with 'stakeholders inside and outside the university'
From a financial point of view, the following conclusion of the Minister is untenable: “… it is not correct to suggest that because we have a certain amount of cash surpluses, that …. our fiscal position is better than we have stated ….”. In finance, a cash position is always a more accurate reflection of a company’s financial health than a profit and loss statement, 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘰𝘥.𝗖𝗮𝘀𝗵 𝗶𝘀 𝗰𝗮𝘀𝗵! You cannot have different versions of your cash position. Whereas, a profit and loss statement can come in different versions depending on the accounting principles you use. The same applies to our budgeting process – the cash surplus being the most accurate indicator while the budget depends on how the Government accounts for the cash, ie., what cash to include or exclude from the revenues of the budget.
It is also inaccurate to compare the land owned by the Government to the land owned by a family. When a family sells its land, the land is indeed lost until it decides to repurchase the land with cash again. However, when the government has sold its land for cash, it can resell the same piece of land again after 99 years under the 99-year leasehold system. Families and individual Singaporeans have to worry about the 99-year lease but to the Government, land sales are a 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁 revenue source.
